Lupin The 3rd: The Movie: The Secret Of Mamo (DVD)

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Ah, another "Lupin the 3rd" movie. Despite being quite old (this movie was originally released in 1978), Lupin the 3rd continues to be a hit comic franchise in the Japanese animation world. As is pretty typical even today, it all started with a popular manga (graphic novels), then a TV series was produced, and then came many movies. But enough history, what about this particular movie?

The movie assumes that you are familiar with the Lupin universe, so none of the characters are introduced. Don´t worry though, Pioneer included a handy character guide in the insert booklet that tells you all you need to know. Suffice to say here that Lupin is a masterful thief, Jigen is his expert-marksmen cohort, Goemon is a samurai that helps Lupin, Fujiko is Lupin´s love interest, rival thief, and all around foil, and Zenigata is the police detective who has been hunting Lupin since day one.

The movie starts out with a shocking turn of events- Lupin being hung! Then some text goes by on the screen, detailing the results of an autopsy report. The writing was changed to English for this DVD, and the original Japanese kanji are gone. After the credits, we´re treated to a vintage Lupin caper—stealing a precious artifact in Egypt right from under Zenigata´s nose. Later, Lupin meets up with Fujiko in order to trade her the relic in return for a reward. Like she does half the time, Fujiko double crosses Lupin, taking the artifact to her benefactor, the mysterious Mamo.

From there on out, the movie follows a series of twists and turns, as Lupin and company try to get to the bottom of who Mamo is, why he wanted the Egyptian artifact, and whose side Fujiko is on this time. Clocking in at about a hundred minutes, I thought the movie seemed a little long. I seriously thought it was over after seventy minutes, and was surprised that there was thirty minutes left to go. I´m not sure whether I should credit that as a really surprising plot twist, or as just one twist too many. On the one hand, the movie could have easily ended there, but on the other hand, the last part wasn´t just filler either.

Lupin´s character is based on an early 20th century French literary character. That character is the gentleman thief, Arsene Lupin, who only robbed from bad people and helped the deserving. In fact, Lupin is supposed to be Arsene´s grandson, hence "the 3rd."

All of the "Lupin the 3rd" features are, at their heart, outrageous comedies. The characters are drawn in an exaggerated style, laws of physics are ignored, and Lupin and the gang do it all with a wink and a grin. The sheer chutzpah that Lupin exerts while doing the impossible is what entertains me the most about this movie. Not once does he seem to even entertain the thought that he might lose.

Video:
The video aspect ratio is anamorphic 16:9 widescreen. Because this was animated way back in 1978, the colors aren´t always solid, there are definite artifacts, as well as one or two times when some motion is obviously a still frame being dragged. Not everything is as fully animated as I would have liked, but keep in mind that this was made back in the day when every cel actually had to be hand drawn and painted. Scary, huh? Still, it didn´t come out too bad, the defects certainly aren´t enough to make the film less enjoyable.